John and Rodney's Mainland Adventure Series

by Tazmy

Infirmary escapes, a monster turtle, insanity, mermaids and more!

2. Rodney and Turtle's Atlantis Adventure

Turtle Soup: The George Adventure Series

This is a series of interconnected but complete humor stories. Rated I for Insanity.

Index: John and Rodney's Mainland Adventure; Rodney and Turtle's Atlantis Adventure; Rodney's Mermaid Adventure.

(Posted separately: John and George's Christmas Adventure)

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Rodney and Turtle's Atlantis Adventure

There are many great accomplishments to which I am proud to attach my name. For instance, when I was twelve I built a robot programmed to follow my sister around and shock her. It was all in fun until the robot got loose and started attacking some of the neighborhood children. I still think my sister was responsible for that bit of reprogramming, but moving on...

To tell the truth, I found its new purpose just as amusing as its original one, but after Ted Ramkins was admitted to the hospital for my robot's dealings, I realized that perhaps I had gone too far. What really got to me, though, were the expressions on my parent's faces. Icy stares that were so cold they could have given me hypothermia. I would only see those stares one more time in my life.

Elizabeth and Carson were as mirror images to my parents the day that Sheppard and I brought turtle back to Atlantis.

"For the love of...What is that?" Carson managed to sputter out while helping an innocent-looking colonel onto a gurney.

"It followed us home," was Sheppard's nonchalant response. Easy for him to be so relaxed about it all, Carson was going to knock him out while I was left to face Elizabeth's fury.

"It followed you home?" Elizabeth reiterated, turning her gaze onto me as though I had some better explanation.

"Yes. That's right. It was rather...um...insistent actually."

The giant aberration clicked its claws for emphasis, causing every marine and otherwise to take some cautious steps backward. Watching the turtle from behind Elizabeth's back, I watched as it settled itself in the middle of the bay, closing its black eyes and retracting its claws.

Carson and his team were making their way out of the bay so I turned to follow, only to have Elizabeth grab my arm.

"Rodney." I could see the vein throbbing on her forehead, as though Sheppard and I were the cause of her needing Carson's special sleeping pills.

"Elizabeth."

"Get that thing out of here. Now."

"Who me? Um... Shouldn't I be checking on Sheppard and...Cold. Yes. I think I caught a cold out there. I should get to the infirmary before we have an epidemic."

"Rodney."

"Seriously. You wouldn't want..."

"Go. Just go. But I expect you to report to me directly after Carson releases you. Do I make myself clear?"

"Perfectly."

I turned my back and readied for my escape, only to hear a few thumps, screams, and then a swoosh with which I had become far too familiar with over the past day. Turning back around, sure enough there was turtle sitting no less than a foot away from me. Marines were scattered on various areas of the floor, while others had their guns raised at the abomination. Thank god they were smart enough not to shoot, or the ricochets from the shell would seriously have left someone injured, and knowing my luck, it would be me.

"What do you want?"

The turtle looked up to me, moving forward and nudging its head against my leg once more. Why does it have to do that? "Oh god, go away. Shoo. Go..."

Unperturbed, the thing moved closer to me, even as I was taking steps away. "And this would be why we had no choice but to bring it here."

"Sounds like you made a friend." The fury was starting to subside from Elizabeth's eye, replaced by a sparkle of humor. Looking around, I could see she wasn't the only one.

"Oh yes, laugh. I'm sure this is just one giant comedic scene. Don't you all have something better to do, like I don't know, getting this damn thing off of me!"

Even a little bratty kid would have gotten the point by now that I didn't want them around, but not turtle. No, he just kept moving that long head of his, his pointy teeth far too close to my limbs to mean anything good.

The marines moved to take it from behind, which meant I was supposed to play distracter. Proving that once again my mental health was in dire straights, I started to pet the turtle's head. Its skin reminded me of my grandmother's: rough, scaly, and nauseating to touch. Problem was that it seemed to think the same about me, because the next thing I knew, it was growling.

The marines took that as their cue and pounced. Turtle wasted no time, however, and swiveled around letting loose its claws of fury. What happened next, I couldn't say, because that's when I decided to run the hell as the fast I could. I could hear its familiar swoosh gaining on me, but the transporter was close enough for me to just make it. I jumped in, hit the destination, and watched as turtle sped toward the closing door. I was free.

By the time I reached the infirmary, I could hear Elizabeth calling for reinforcements and for me. Not that I bothered answering. I was far too important to be lost trying to stop a mutant turtle. I wondered briefly if it was a teenager. Certainly qualified as a ninja.

Sheppard was already lying on a bed, his leg wrapped up, by the time I entered. Carson was asking him some questions, clearly waiting to drug the colonel until after he had some decent answers. Sheppard waved me toward them just as Carson injected a needle into his IV.

"Same time tomorrow?" he asked. I made a note to have Heightmeyer check his sanity before plopping myself on the adjacent bed.

"You do realize that they've been calling you on the com." Leave it to Carson to state the blatantly obvious.

"Really? I thought they were calling the other McKay here. You know the less handsome and brilliant one. The one that's never there when you need him."

Carson finished with his voodoo magic on Sheppard then headed toward me with a blood pressure cuff. I held out my arm, readied for the motions that followed every mission. At least with a medical check-up every three days, I always knew I was in decent health. Unless I was dying and Carson wouldn't tell me because he thought I couldn't take it.

"So you stole a jumper, took an injured teammate to the beach, allowed him to incur further injury, and then brought back an alien turtle that could be carrying any number of diseases. Think that just about covers it?" Carson shoved the thermometer in a little too hard for my liking, and patted my arm with more of his annoyed slaps.

"Yeah. That sounds just about right. Not that we wanted to bring the turtle back, but it didn't give us much... Did you say diseases? Do you think I'm infected with something? I mean, we meet alien life forms all the time right. What makes this..."

"I'm sure you're fine, Rodney. Until I come up with a suitable punishment of course."

"Punishment? What am I, in preschool? I never forced Sheppard to come with me you know, I simply realized it was stupid for him to go out there alone."

"Sure you did. And as for being in preschool, well..."

That would be about the time Elizabeth entered, supported on both sides by two marines. Her pant leg was torn, revealing fresh cuts of oozing blood down her right thigh. Crap.

"Elizabeth. Are you all right? Did...I..."

There was that hypothermic glare again. Carson hoisted her up on a table and got to work. Elizabeth, for her part, just kept staring at me. As if this were all my fault...

"Rodney, you are going down to the jumperbay now and you are getting everything sorted out. Do you understand me?"

"I'm far too..."

"Now, Rodney!"

I always felt this horrible lurch in my stomach when guards flanked me. It was this idea of being shot, kidnapped, held prisoner, or...Well, whatever it was, I had it that day as the guards did just that. Clearly, Elizabeth hadn't heard the part where scientists, unlike marines, still had free will.

"Right. I'll just, um, go to the bay and see what I can do then."

So it was that I was marched to certain doom by two men too stupid to realize just how important I was and how bad an idea it was to sacrifice me to an alien turtle.

Turtle was just where I left him, in the center of the bay. Only now, it was surrounded by at least a dozen marines, a few of whom were sporting a nasty injury or two. Before I could speak, turtle had already turned around and raced right up to me, nudging my leg once more.

"I'm sorry, perhaps you missed the part where you were overstaying your welcome," I said. Not that turtle understood. He just kept nudging me and I was convinced I had just entered hell.

There really was only one solution, and it didn't take a genius of my caliber to figure it out. It did, however, apparently take someone like me as far as turtle was concerned. Ignoring the marines' flinches, I started walking toward the jumper, whose hatch had yet to close. Marching in, turtle followed like a two-year-old being led into a candy story.

Taking a seat at the pilot chair, I heard turtle make himself comfortable in the center of the floor. Now it was just time to find the most backward area of the mainland I could find and hope this turtle couldn't find its way home. "Well, I guess it's just you and me now," I said.

Unfortunately, the puddlejumper decided for some reason not to turn on. I flipped the right switches and sent out all the silent commands at least three or four dozen times, but to no avail. The jumper refused to budge.

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me. You were working fine ten minutes ago!"

Another swoosh sound and turtle was by my side, nudging my leg.

"What do you want now?"

Its smile would make the Cheshire cat proud.

"You're doing this, aren't you? Well stop it. I'm taking you home and you just have to live with that."

Turtle nudged me again. I was starting to think that was all turtle could do, other than eat all my rations of course.

"What the hell am I saying? Hell, why am I even talking to you?"

Turtle then decided to use an old trick called baring his sharp, pointy teeth.

"Oh, right. Well, then..."

Turtle nudged me again; I think it might even have purred.

"Alright, let's go. Next stop, jumper two." Turtle followed without further comment, and soon we were playing the same old game again. Turtle got comfy on the floor, I headed to the pilot chair, and the jumper refused to start up.

"I don't know how you're doing this, but please stop!"

I grabbed the nearest scanner from a nearby compartment and ran it down turtle's body. A slimy, horrifying wad of spit grabbed hold of my hand as turtle's fang cut right through the Ancient technology. It scarfed the whole meal down in one large bite, but there was enough of a pause for me to notice that the scanner was on even after the turtle let go. "Oh that's just great, isn't it? Who the hell gave a turtle the gene?"

Turtle smiled up at me.

"You're just waiting to eat me, aren't you?"

Turtle and I were still in the midst of our stare-down when Carson's voice came over the headset, "Rodney."

"I'm sort of busy at the moment, Carson. Unless you have a way to kill this thing, go away."

"Actually, I need you to bring the bugger down here. Seeing as how it injured Elizabeth and now a few others, it would be best if I made sure it wasn't carrying anything dangerous."

"Oh yeah, just keep putting it all on my shoulders why don't you? Would you like me to prove the existence of dark matter while I'm at it? Or perhaps wrestle a tiger into submission, hm?"

"Ah, quit your buggering and just get it down here."

Zelenka and the best of my scientists showed up to start dissecting the machinery from head to toe just as turtle and I made our way out of the hatch and toward the infirmary.

Turned out turtle was good for something. As we made our way down the corridor, we passed at least six of my scientists. Each interaction was simple, going something like this:

"Ah. Dr. McKay. You're back. Can you please check my...Oh my God, what is that behind you?"

It was actually entertaining watching them scurry away in panic. And they said I was a coward? Ha! Judging by how fast Dr. Brown bolted, I think she beat the galactic record for fastest twenty kilometer run. I should have given her a trophy or at least a snide remark or two, but turtle was too busy staring at her and not me. "Well, come on," I shouted at it. Turtle slowly turned around and followed with his head down. "Yeah, I think she's cute too. If only she didn't think I was crazy. Maybe it would help if I wasn't talking to you..."

I didn't really know what the deal with turtle was, how he got the gene and how strong it had to have been for him to have so much control, but he was capable of doing more than just stopping jumpers.

"Not as if it isn't obvious, but this is not the infirmary," I said as I exited the lift only to find that we were a number of levels below where we should be. Turtle smiled, that's how I knew he was responsible. That and the fact transporters didn't just randomly take you to the wrong place.

I was just about to press the new destination when turtle used his hundred or so legs to dash out of the lift and into the corridor. If I hadn't seen with my own eyes the direction he had fled, the screams from the commissary sure gave it away.

The place was deserted by the time I got there, except for a marine or two trying to act brave. "What? You want to be eaten? Scat!" Turned out that they could run fast as well.

I turned to turtle who was wasting no time in digging into the buffet line's chow with his frightful large teeth. "What, you just randomly know how to get to the messhall and can control Ancient equipment? This must be a nightmare. Some gigantic nightmare."

Turtle didn't even pause to smile this time.

"Alright, you've had enough. Come on, I have more important things to do than babysit a monster."

Turtle lifted his head, meeting his black eyes to my blue ones. At first, I thought he might actually follow my lead out of the mess, especially once he started walking toward me, but it was too good to be true. Instead, he made his way into a cabinet, forcing it open through a combination of teeth and claws. Now it was my turn to pause. He'd just broken into the motherlode of chocolate.

"Well, I suppose we could pause for just a few minutes." Turtle nudged some chocolate my way and with the messhall empty, there was no one there to complain. Stacking some in my pockets and vest, I waited for turtle to get his own fill before exiting the room.

We arrived at the infirmary only to have about twenty marines scamper out of the way. Each of them held their own turtle badge of courage and was far from ready to receive another. Beckett ushered us into a private area with some of the biologists, where I noticed Sheppard had been moved in the chaos.

"The whole lot wasn't going to let him sleep," Carson explained. "Now let's get a look at you."

Carson took a step forward. Turtle took one back and bared its teeth. Beckett took another step forward and turtle scurried behind me.

"Come now, it won't hurt a bit."

Turtle started to clap his claws.

"For the love of... Rodney, I think you need to be the one to do this. Just find some soft skin and inject this."

"Why? What is it?"

"Just a sedative so we can see what this little...uh...big guy is made of."

Even with the needle in my hand, turtle didn't look happy. "You're not going to hurt him are you?"

"I'm going to do what I have to to make sure no one is going to get sick from this, Rodney."

"What do you mean by that?"

Turtle nudged my leg and this time didn't complain as I reached down to pet his head.

"I mean we'll do what we must. We'll do our best not to hurt it but..."

I looked back at turtle who looked up at me with pleading eyes. "No one is sick right? Why worry about it now?"

"Symptoms can take a long time to show themselves, Rodney. You know that. We should run some tests."

Turtle bared his teeth again, but I kept petting him. "He didn't mean to hurt anyone. He's just scared."

"Aye, but we still have to be sure. He'll probably be fine."

"Probably?"

"It is standard procedure, Rodney."

"You're going to do the same thing to him that you did to the squirrel Major Lorne brought home, aren't you?"

"If it comes to that, yes. It is an alien creature, Rodney." Carson's had us up against a corner now. I glanced from it to the exit and back to Carson.

"He'll hurt you if you try to get to him."

"Which is why we need your help."

"No."

"Excuse me."

"No. I won't let you hurt him. Get out."

"Rodney..."

"Now. Or I...I...I won't stop him from hurting you."

Turtle clicked his claws and bared his teeth for emphasis. "There, you see. He's smarter than to let you near."

A few more clicks, and the turtle dashed right up to them, threatening to run them over without hesitation. Beckett and his cronies bolted.

"What the hell did I just do?" I asked myself, locking the door in their wake.

"Rodney?"

"Colonel?"

"What is going on here?"

"Um...I thought you might like a visitor for uh...a while."

I was going to need reinforcements. It didn't take much to build the robot that attacked my sister and half of my neighborhood, just a little ingenuity. That was exactly what I needed this time. So I grabbed some scalpels, medical devices, and whatever else I could find and set myself to work.

"What are you doing?"

"Turtle will only hold them off for so long. When they find out that turtle is harmless, we'll need some insurance."

"Harmless? Didn't it attack half of my marines?"

"He was scared."

Sheppard gave me one of his looks before falling back onto his pillow. "You're crazy."

"Maybe. Can you hand me that needle over there? Thanks."

Robot attacker number two was far superior to the first, and another one of those great marvels to be attributed to me. It was a tranquilizing robot built to sneak up on its victim and knock them out. Not as cool as shocking, but this was serious business.

Turtle, don't ask me how, managed to crawl up on the foot of Sheppard's bed. At first Sheppard looked ready to complain, but then shrugged. "Any particular reason you're protecting this thing?"

"Chocolate. And the fact he saved our lives. Go to sleep."

"Nah. Not tired anymore. Given any thought as to what we might do next time?"

"Excuse me?"

"Next time. Same time tomorrow, right?"

"You're the one that's crazy, Colonel."

"You're the one protecting a monster turtle."

Turtle started with the purring sound again. My robot built, I went and petted turtle's head without a second thought. It kind of reminded me of my cat.

"It needs a name," Sheppard mumbled somewhere in his dreamless sleep.

"I like calling him Turtle."

"How about George?"

"What is your obsession with naming things?"

"Rodney, we need you to open the door," Elizabeth's voice came from the nearby ground where I had dropped my headset. I didn't bother replying.

"Rodney. I am ordering you to open the door."

"I don't really like George."

"It looks like a George."

Turtle nodded his head at this, at least I think that was what it was doing. I shrugged, trying to ignore Sheppard's smug look.

"Rodney, if you don't open that door, so help me."

It took a good five hours before someone met Mr. Roboto. They'd be out for a good six hours, so I did my best to push them out the door. A few marines took that opportunity to grab onto me, to which turtle responded by racing up to me and clipping its claws at the marines. "Don't shoot!" I shouted, catching sight of the few guns in the room. Idiots. Pathetic idiots.

Lt. Samson got caught in the crossfire, but at least it only nicked his arm.

My activated robots were running loose now, much too small for the marines to notice. When the two that grabbed my arms fell limp, I took my opportunity to race back into the room with turtle covering my back. Locked into safety, I held on to turtle's shell while checking him for injuries.

"They fired at you. With me right there. Are they idiots? Are you hurt, George? They didn't get you right? I'm fine, though." He turned his black eyes down, apparently satisfied that I wasn't lying.

"Rodney, this is Teyla. May I please come in?"

"Don't let her. It's just a trick to get George."

"As if I didn't know that, Colonel. Now go to sleep already."

That earned me a few minutes of relaxation, in which turtle...George...was able to cuddle up to me and start resting his head. I started on more robots.

"So what is your excuse?"

"I thought I told you to go to bed."

"You're hiding a turtle and making miniature robots to fight my marines. I personally find it entertaining, what's your excuse for being so crazy?"

"Think twelve robots will be enough?"

"I'd go with thirteen. You do realize you're insane right? Keep going at this pace, and Heightmeyer will fit you to a nice white jacket."

"Fifteen it is."

Turtle had fifteen large circles on his shell, each with varying diameters and skewed in their own ways. The circles varied in color shades as well. What really got to me though, was the way the circles interlapped in symmetric patterns.

"Rodney, Ronon is coming. I promise we'll take care of your turtle friend, but if you don't allow Ronon to get in there, I won't be responsible for what he does. Rodney?"

It helped to stare at the shell in order to drown out Elizabeth's voice. Ronon's weapons could probably penetrate it, and that was one step I wasn't about to accept. Turtle looked up at me and wandered toward the door. He understood.

"It's been fun."

"You're telling me."

"I was talking to the turtle, Colonel."

"Oh, well, by all means, don't let me interrupt."

It had the most sorrowful black eyes I had ever seen. "I have to open the door."

I think it moaned.

"I have to, George, because I can't let Ronon kill you. But you do me a favor, okay. If they try to hurt you, bare your teeth and growl. I know you can."

He nodded. I opened the door.

Turtle put up quite the show in defending me, but it was my robots that made me the most proud. Fifteen had been a bit of an underestimate, so there were still a good ten guards left in the room when George finally allowed himself to be dragged away. Teyla took a steady hold of my left arm and someone unknown grabbed my right. I put up quite the fight, desperate to see what they would do to George, but Beckett was as quick with the needle as were my robots. It was time I got some sleep anyway.

SGA

I woke up the next morning with a headache that was probably around a number 5 on the Richter scale. Teyla was between Sheppard's and my own bed. "How are you feeling, Rodney?" she asked in a soothing, calm voice.

"What happened?" I had the fleeting images of turtles running through my head, with claws and feet. What the...

"It turns out you weren't lying about having a cold. An odd Pegasus version of one anyway," Weir said. She was on my other side, her hand resting on my blanket.

"Beckett had cleared me," I mumbled. Bits and pieces broke through the fog.

"He would have had to do a full blood test to find it. It looks like you'll be fine now, though."

"George?" I asked, a little confused.

"The turtle's fine. Carson had him brought back to the mainland. Turned out he was actually as harmless as you claimed."

"Oh."

"The cold had some effect on your hypothalamus. I don't think you were...well..thinking correctly. But if you want, you can go and visit him when you get better."

I nodded, still not sure what to make of all being said. Teyla and Weir, satisfied that I was okay, moved out of the room.

"So what are we going to do tomorrow, Brain?" Sheppard slipped over the edge of his bed, his loud voice paying no respect to the pain in my head.

"Sleep?"

"You did quite the job of entertaining me today. I'm not sure you can top it. But I do expect you to try."

"Sheppard?"

"Yes?"

"Shut up."

As far as hypothermic stares went, well, they sucked. I much preferred the smile Sheppard was giving me because written all over it was friendship. Sickness or no, I don't know if people realized how much of my insanity was done for Sheppard's humor. I wouldn't tell him that though. This sick excuse was a sure fire way to get Elizabeth to never mention any of this again. Especially the bit about stealing a jumper.

I couldn't believe he still wanted more entertainment. I decided that tomorrow I would build a robot to shock Sheppard just like I did once for my sister. That would at least keep him entertained for a while.